SCIENCE RESEARCH

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 185, 3 May 1933, Page 10

SCIENCE RESEARCH

Neglected by Industry OVERCOMING PREJUDICES “Fewer than five per cent, of those in our University Colleges who take chemistry as a degree subject enter industry, and tho’se who graduate in that science enter the teaching profession or Government employ as chemists.” asserted Air. T. A. Glendinning, Al. Sc., in an address to the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry last evening. “Tin’s means that manufacturers’ sons, and those upon whom the secondary industries of New Zealand depend, have no interest in a university’training in chemistry, and when we remember that the. Slate —that is, the taxpayer—supports the equivalent of fouruniversities in addition to agricultural colleges and a scientific research department, this is surely food for serious thought. “There is uo country in the world to-day,” said Air. Glendinning, “whose industries can afford lo ignore the university and neglect the technical school. There" is no tariff which can keep trade moving one way only, and as long as we import goods from other countries we are bound to compete with their skill and knowledge.. We can prohibit those goods, but that means arriving ultimately at the state of Alark Twain’s village, whose inhabitants lived by taking in each other’s washing. As far as I can see, any definite approach between university and industry will have to come from the university by its encouragement <i technological work and courses. AVe cannot yet found university chairs of industry, but there is much that could be done nevertheless. . .”

Speaking on the development of chemistry in industry in Great Britain, Air. Glendinning said that where a manufacturer was gifted with _ vision he encouraged tlie young chemist to get into the works and learn all that he could of the processes, with the result that he soon became valuable and could command a good salary. On the other hand, there were many employers who, through ignorance or fear of their foreman, locked up their chemist in the laboratory, treating him as a tame analyst and expecting Inin by some occult powers to control methods, reduce costs of production, and improve processes. Needless to say, they were often disappointed, but whatever the circumstances, the young chemist had always to overcome prejudice, suspicion and sometimes opposition. Even to-day there were research chemists, appointed since the war, who were constantly hampered in their investigations and harried for results.